The Time Is Now

Jared Bednar has never had this much goaltending depth at any point during his tenure as head coach of the Avalanche. Darcy Kuemper is better than Philipp Grubauer and if both Kuemper and Francouz manage to stay healthy, I wouldn’t be surprised if Colorado wins one of, if not both, the division and Presidents’ trophies again.

This is the first time that Colorado enters an 82 game schedule as Stanley Cup favorite since the golden era of Forsberg, Sakic and Roy. No covid bubble, restrictions, dead arenas, bizarre divisions, shortened seasons or weird playoff format - just a regular 82 game NHL season. It almost feels surreal.

Some people have questioned the loss of forward depth up front but I believe that’s been blown way out of proportion.

Losing Saad and Donskoi isn’t ideal but it’s time for young talent to step up and players like Alex Newhook and potentially Sampo Ranta and Martin Kaut could do that.

Colorado has the most points (174) and wins (81) in the NHL over the last two campaigns, most of any team in the entire league and the current roster has the potential to continue that trend. Nathan MacKinnon, Mikko Rantanen and Cale Makar are primed to set career highs but the second round of the playoffs remains a big question.

Can the Colorado Avalanche finally reach the third round?

Marcus Aurelius once wrote, “The impediment to action advances action. What stands in the way becomes the way.” - these guys are elite athletes that learn from every failure they’ve ever encountered, that’s why they’re playing hockey at the highest level possible.

I have no doubt in my mind that they will use the losses as fuel to be better than last season.